Tuesday, January 6, 2009

Knogging a Dead Horse: Product Test Follow-Up

Further to yesterday's post, you may remember that I mentioned I had experienced a one-in-three failure rate with the Knog Frog lights I received. Well, I've since learned from Knog that there was a faulty batch way back in January 2008, and this batch was recalled and rectified. However, there were still some bad Knogs in their sample stock, which found their way to me.

I'd hate to be responsible for promulgating a misapprehension that Knogs are unreliable, especially after the people at Knog so generously helped me customize my "whip" for free. After all, fairness is more important to me than maintaining both my irascibility and my risibility, and a company should not be judged by the samples they keep laying around for freeloading Knog-grubbers such as myself.

Rest assured I have no intention of becoming a serial product-tester or some kind of Zinnian or Huangian product reviewer. However, given the circumstances I did think it was fair to give Knog a chance to redeem themselves. I also want to maintain the good will that exists between me and the companies whose dorky products I ridicule. So I devised a quick test. Here is a pink Knog Frog, which does indeed look very much like something that has been excised from someone's skin and is awaiting biopsy:

First, I held the Knog under a stream of running water in order to simulate the conditions it would encounter on the fenderless seatpost of a fixter's bike. (Fixters hate fenders.):

It held up admirably.

Next, I compared it to a competing light modeled after an animal: the Serfas Guppy Light. (I just happened to have one lying around. Yes, I've already admitted to owning both plastic toe clips and a Serfas Guppy Light, and it's only Tuesday!) While the Knog grips to just about any surface like the malignant growth that it is, the Guppy clings tenaciously to it by means of a flimsy elastic cord. Here's the Knog in a bowl of water, and the Guppy awaiting submersion. Surely the Guppy is fishlike in shape and name only, and surely it will be extinguished when I send it to join the Knog down in Davey Jones's Locker at the bottom of my cereal bowl:

Well, not exactly. It survived the submersion test:

Incidentally, it was also buoyant--kind of like a Cheerio. I had to hold it under the water to properly administer the test.

At this point I realized I had a good old-fashioned product shootout on my hands, so I selected a third contender. I decided to go "old school" for this one, since now that p-fars are hot again people are surely in the market for more "period-correct" forms of illumination. I chose a candle:

Here is the candle mounted on my Empire State Courier. (The Empire State Courier has apparently found a niche in my stable as a product testing bike. I also used it last night to go to the store to buy juice, so I suppose it's also now my "juice bike." This is a nice complement to my Ironic Orange Julius Bike.) Like the Knog, the candle can be mounted just about anywhere, which already gives it an advantage over the Guppy. But would it survive the water test?

Of course not:

So I'm hereby awarding first place in the bike light shootout to the Knog Frog, with the Serfas Guppy and the candle tied for second. (The Guppy may be water- and windproof, but the candle scores major retro points.) You can rest assured that if you buy a Knog Frog you are not only buying a waterproof light that's better than a candle, but you're also going to look like a raging hipster.

In other product news, it appears that the riser bar grip of choice for the fixter set, the Oury, has been demoted from grip to spacer:

This is a sad day indeed for the Oury people. As everbody knows, the further towards the middle of the handlebar a grip migrates the more irrelevant it becomes. This almost certainly presages an irreversible slide towards the dreaded "Stem of Obscurity." After that, the only hope is that the grip will one day become retro and re-emerge on the business end of the bar. (Unless this particular owner is simply deciding how narrow he wants to cut his bars. In that case it's possible the Ourys will prevail after all.)

Incidentally, I noticed in yesterday's comments that some readers are confused by the initials "RTMS," by which I occasionally refer to myself. These of course refer to the days when I was apparently "jumping the shark" (which happened sometime between my second-ever post and today's, depending on who you ask) and decided to change my name to an unpronounceable symbol. That unpronounceable symbol was actor Rip Torn's Mug Shot:

As a big fan of Rip Torn, I'd like to give him the benefit of the doubt--not with regard to the drunk driving (something tells me Torn can put it away), but with regard to the claim that he was driving a 1994 Subaru with a Christmas tree tied to the top. Surely an actor of Torn's stature and vintage would either engage a fancy automobile and a chauffeur, or else dispatch some sort of assistant or domestic to fetch his yulephernalia for him.

Naturally none of this is to diminish the seriousness of drunk driving, which is a deplorable practice. Furthermore, if Torn is in fact guilty I'm dismayed that he's sullied his image which I'm using without any sort of permission or restitution in order to promote myself. (I suppose I'm tearing a page out of the Performance catalog in that respect.) After all, his poor behavior reflects poorly on me as well.

Speaking of awful drivers, the New York City Taxi and Limousine Commissioner wants to mount cameras on cabs to detect reckless driving. As a cyclist who's molested (not sexually) by cabs almost daily I'm all in favor of this. Sure, it may be unnecessary in that everybody already knows taxi drivers are reckless (it's sort of like conducting an investigation to determine whether ice is slippery and cold), but we might as well get it on film anyway. Of course, the drivers themselves are against this, and the head of the Taxi Worker's Alliance says that, "I thought in America the law was you're innocent until proven guilty." Well, this may be true, but we are talking about taxi drivers. I once saw a taxi in a Starbucks on 8th Avenue in Manhattan. Not a taxi driver buying a coffee in Starbucks, but an actual taxi that had been driven into the storefront. Something tells me that it wasn't the Starbucks's fault. And if somehow it was and the Starbucks was jaywalking or something, I'm sure the driver would be very pleased to have a video record of what would otherwise be a very implausible story.

Yes, we live in a topsy-turvy world in which professional cyclists on whom nobody's lives depend are tested weekly for drug use, yet taxi drivers who are capable of killing people both inside and outside of their cabs in an instant decry having video cameras mounted on their cars. So again, I'll go on record as saying I'm in favor of it--at least until a taxi-mounted camera catches me doing something illegal on my bike and I get in trouble for it, at which point I will decide it's unconstitutional and an invasion of my privacy.

Those aren't hand grips, they're elephant-trunk skid ball-pads. Next is the stem protector revival from the BMX days. Top tubes were just the beginning. Pretty soon people will start putting chainstay protectors on their bikes. Harumph!

I would suggest you relugate flaunting of any more free stuff to at least three months from now - bikes, scarves, free cysts...what's next an all expense paid trip to climb Alpe d'Huez on a cyst covered free Scantante?

I realize it's 2009 - year of the "I guess I don't really need that 'baby's dressed up in costumes' calendar after all" and you've got to make living somehow, but your reputation as a sellout free blogger is at stake.

If you can get a "fixie" in a box from a mega-retailer, then its place in the cool universe is over. But what will replace it? The p-far? That's hard to believe. This thing is inconvenient enough to appeal. http://www.philosophyblog.com.au/images/leonardo-da-vinci-machines-bicycle1.JPG

Last cab driver that nearly ended my days was accelerating around a corner as I walked on the crosswalk, his head craned around about 180 degrees to check if he could still get ahead of the fire engine whose blaring siren he evidently heard.

At least with video they could see what they would have seen if they had been looking where they were going.

As I vas sayink to Milton deh other day in deh elevator, some people just don't get it. Funny, I'm not tryink to be..I schpell phonetically and if dis is deh vay I talk, dats vat you get. So sue me. And as for mine Snobala, I vas verry happy to see dat he used a Chanukah candle on his handlebars. Such a nice boy. Such pretty pictures too! Oysh.

Hey Snob,Not only do you admit to having plastic toe clips and a Serfas Guppy Light just lying around the house, but you also have Birthday Candles just lying around!What else you got in your little grab bag?

On the bright side, the Snob has inspired me. Next year for Chanukah, I'm gonna skip the menorah and light candles directly onto my bike's top tube (does anybody know if this is safe on carbon fiber?).

Hey Snobbie, if'n I remember right, the original Affinity pursuit track frame used a 26.4 post. You might be able to finagle another whip fer the product testing yet, and that would look oooo so much better with the lil knoggies crawlin' around on it.

I had the same problems with those Knog lights. The first I brought home only had the solid light on. Went back to the shop and got another. I tested it there and found the thing didn't turn on. Me and the shop dude spent a good 20 minutes going through his inventory until we finally found one that worked and was white! But once you get that right, these lights are tight.

Having been exiled to ride Trans-Siberian Railway to bring awareness of performance enhancing nutritional supplements. I am giving mountain bike with dual suspension to make easier to ride over railroad ties, yet I can balance on rails when not to be covered with snow and ice.

I am made it to Yekaterinburg and to have hippie lights sent to me. Is to be making dodging trains that come along easier if they see me and sound horn. Hippie lights are to help much to be seen during harsh Siberian riding conditions.

...bsnyc/rtms...yer quite safe as regards not becoming a zinn-ian product tester...the very knowledgeable mr zinn would have posted a 1500 word treatise w/ procedural drawings from his testing process, as to why the candle wouldn't work under water......there would also be a sidebar referencing how many candles you'd need to carry on a ride of a particular duration "should it be a dry night"...

...& taxis ???...jeezus...i was in a taxi late at night last week & that s.o.b. hit 80mph on the open road...while the driver was undoubtedly certifiable, at least he was competent behind the wheel...some of those clowns shouldn't be allowed use of a knife & fork, never mind the wheel of a moving vehicle...

i appreciate your product reviewing ability. however, the following sentence makes no sense:

"which does indeed look very much like something that has been excised from someone's skin and is awaiting biopsy"

a biopsy is when you take a small bit of a larger growth. excising is removing the whole thing. so it's either "something that has been excised and is awaiting identification" or "something that needs to be biopsied," as in, "what the fuck is that giant thing growing on your ear?"

Did anyone else notice that the lovely Mercier featured in todays post is setup with no brakes, a freewheel, and clipless mountain pedals? Lovely to see Darwinian evolution at work. If he ever actually rides this bike, it's over!

Interestingly, it was an "old school" technology called "direct current" that allowed your shootout (and I'm not referring to the typical shootout on thinks of when they think about NYC) to go into overtime.

Please do not be too hard on Mr. Torn. Many of us have been in his predicament, having to plead 'not guilty' and so forth, in my case 'nolo contendere.' Has a classical ring to it, that plea does. Many of us have had to transport christmas trees atop subarus, or in my case a VW. As deplorable a practice as drunk driving, or that is alleged drunk driving (the difference between nolo and not guilty - with nolo the "alleged" goes away) surely is, one has to get home with the tree. I think they are using Mr. Torn's disheveled appearance against him. It is to your credit, BSNYC, that you honor Mr. Torn even through his darkest night, or holiday season as the case may be.

---------"I schpell phonetically and if dis is deh vay I talk, dats vat you get. So sue me. And as for mine Snobala, I vas verry happy to see dat he used a Chanukah candle on his handlebars. Such a nice boy. Such pretty pictures too! Oysh."-----------

Gotta dust off my set of custom Toons clubs for the upcoming Top Gear Unlimited Crew get together. The pose-off won't be complete without them.

Also, I'm quite sure that today's product testing results will ultimately have some effect on the porn industry, now that Knogs have been proven to prevail in, um, submerged and dampish conditions. Lighting is always a challenge for sepia-toned spelunkery.

...ah, guys...you don't need "consumer protection" per se but if yer new knog is bad, ya gotta be smart enough to take it back from whence it came...

...you tell the store owner & give them the knog...they examine it to see if you have the aptitude to turn the light on & off...if yer not stone crazy, then he or she tells the distributors rep, who in turn passes the word through the distributor & the info goes all the way back to the knog boys n' girls down under in australia & before the word that "hey, problem, anomalous bad batch" even gets that far, you've got a new functioning knog frog...

I had a knog that was labeled white and when I got it home and opened the package it was on the reddish side of white. You know if I didn't know any better I would say it was a red light, ahhh I see now.

It seems the lateist trend towards drop bars expresses a pure form of minimalism lost to the consumer fetishists.As the authentic 10speed had them so the symbolic return to the pre-fixie shopping spree virgin objectestablishes an end to the hipster's hippness exposing a subconscious desire for authenticity.

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About Me

While I love cycling and embrace it in all its forms, I'm also extremely critical. So I present to you my venting for your amusement and betterment. No offense meant to the critiqued. Always keep riding!